(no subject)

[mmkaternater]

Silence from the diagnostics department usually meant one of two things, and those two things were universally at odds with one another: Either things were going well -- and "well" for House and his team meant "progressing under Cuddy's radar as effectively and quietly as possible" -- or they were going terribly. Neither outcome was especially cheering, even on a stunted afternoon in late February, when the first hints of Spring had begun to leak into the collective consciousness.

After her initial consult with House (which had hardly been a consult as much as it was a bargaining session), Cuddy had left much of the diagnostic process to his discretion. She kept her visits to a minimum -- both with the department head and the patient he was treating -- and kept up to date with the progress through impersonal database updates and chart perusals. And, when those proved fruitless (House was notorious for keeping most of his theories in his head and off of paper), she gleaned information from the on-call nurses. She'd learned, for instance, that House had mostly wrapped his pre-standing case and was devoting most of his quota of lab tests and Duckling hours to Don Herrot's troubling brain and lungs. Early on, there had been an incident that she'd red flagged: a catheter had been placed without the use of anesthetic, but Cameron had reported directly from House that, Shrug. Allergic reactions aren't always listed in the medical history.

Now, a week into the case and a week without so much as a word passing between dean and diagnostician, Cuddy began to feel the constriction of worry. Wilson had been mildly helpful in assisting a fraternal diagnosis: "He's just...House," the man had said, and tucked into his beet salad with a raising of block brows, "he's got to know where you stand. Wherever that is."

Knowing where she stood meant that Cuddy had to temporarily step out of herself and into a position where the vulnerable was known to lurk. Her hair was loose when she came to see him, ten-to-three on a murky afternoon that bled with the promise of later sun, and there were softer shapes making up her posture and expression. She was not dressed for work. The effect was strange: a drop of non-Cuddian colour in a Cuddian world. Her sweater was the same pulled-out collar affair that she'd worn in Stockholm, when she'd been more of herself and had rallied him to structure with a tuxedo. Her appearance was cultivated; not an accident.

She pushed inward on the glass that led to his office. Her chin and eyes were level. She cleared her lips of hesitation and made them glossier with tongue's sweep. Her voice came through clearly and without any rumble of throat to precede it:

"I need you for a couple of hours."

Comments

[betteroffdean.livejournal.com]

Cuddy closed her menu when his eyes roved over the top of his own, piled Shar-Pei wrinkles puckering his forehead; leering was one of his more piquant hobbies. She papped her thumb against the edge of the table and drew her shoulders back to the booth's cushion, hand lifting a dark sweep of hair from her shoulder. The cant of her mouth was confident, as were her eyes, and she regarded him with a careful cat's mix of curiosity and wariness --

"Did you really think I slept with Don?"

[addxcted.livejournal.com]

House did not like to admit when he was wrong about anything, even if he had the excuse of being lead on to believe that wrong assumption readily available to him. Cuddy had presented a strong argument to her want to have sex with Don, so it wasn't an outlandish assumption by any means.

"..I couldn't figure out why you did.." But yes, he had thought she'd slept with him. "He's about as sexually intriguing as Foreman."

The waiter took the time right about then to walk up, giving House a very confused expression over what he'd heard. Unfazed (and uncaring; he didn't care if people thought he was gay), he waved the man off under the pretense of still looking at his menu. The waiter made haste to get away.

"Then again, you also seriously considered Wilson as a donor once so a lot can't be said for that." She had...odd taste. Look at who she was sitting opposite.

[betteroffdean.livejournal.com]

"You spend a lot more time with Wilson than I would have," she said, drawing a napkin across her lap and tightening the corners of her mouth, "what does that say about you?" Wilson would have made an admirable father: one of those shirtsleeves men with the ballcap screwed down over his hair on Saturday mornings -- sitting on the sidelines of a Little League game or in the front row of a ballet recital.

House, on the other hand, might not realize he had children until they were eighteen.

[addxcted.livejournal.com]

"Yeah, well, I don't want Wilson to sire my offspring, either." There was an enormous amount of difference between hanging out with Wilson and having a child with Wilson.

As for her assumption on House's parenting abilities, they were a little harsh. He'd notice a kid was there -- hard not too when they're squawling all the time and wrecking things. He just wouldn't necessarily help them so much as hinder their developement.

[betteroffdean.livejournal.com]

The waiter, a hanging dog expression on his face, taxied in the space around their table again before putting his shiny black shoes into gear; he wore a white apron over a starched black shirt and smelled -- not unpleasantly -- of grease. His eyes fixed a little wearily on House, like he was scared to broach another contact, but Cuddy had put her fingers at the edge of the table in a quiet summons.

"The house wine," she said, and felt House's eyes come up at that; she deflected the curve of her smile for the waiter's benefit, "and bread." Provincial tastes for a provincial place. They had good, heavy slices of bread here: the kind that came with flaked crust that had to be micromanaged around the lips, lest you leave a crumb trail behind. Her foot was an easy arc beneath the table. 'Settled the side of it against House's calf.